The introduction to this report makes plain the frustration of those charged with administering the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA). Enacted with much fanfare in 2001, this statute contains a provision that requires that it be reviewed every 5 years to ensure that it remains adequate for the task of protecting the personal information of Canadians in commercial contexts. As the introduction to the Report notes, the first 5 year review ended with a Bill to amend the statute – this Bill died on the order paper and in spite of attempts to resuscitate it, it has never been passed. The second 5 year review has simply stalled. In the meantime, as the report notes, the personal data landscape has been dramatically transformed with the rise of social networking, mobile communications, increased cross-border data collection and sharing, and the growing use of personal information for the profiling and targeting of consumers

PIPEDA is a fairly tentative piece of legislation, giving only ombudsperson powers to the Privacy Commissioner, and favouring an approach that encourages compliance rather than mandating it. This new report issued by the Office of the Privacy Commissioner (OPC) makes it clear that this approach is no longer effective nor is it appropriate to the current data protection context. The Report notes that comparable jurisdictions have moved towards giving data commissioners more powers of enforcement, including order-making powers and the ability to impose fines or other administrative penalties on companies that play fast and loose with personal information. PIPEDA even lags behind the laws of those few provinces that have their own private sector data protection statutes: Commissioners in Quebec, B.C. and Alberta have order making powers, and Alberta also has mandatory data breach notification requirements. The report observes that not only is the toothless PIPEDA a difficult tool to use to gain compliance from large web-based collectors of personal information that are based outside of Canada, it also relies too heavily upon the willingness of domestic companies to take the Commissioner’s findings or audit reports seriously.

The OPC report identifies four pressure points based on their 12 years of experience with the legislation, and makes four recommendations for legislative reform to address each of these.The first pressure point is enforcement. The report explains how the lack of enforcement powers has hindered the ability of the OPC to address data protection issues. It notes, for example, that there is “nothing in the law that provides enough incentive for organizations to invest in privacy in significant ways.” (at p. 6). It notes as well that even when complaints lead to investigation and recommendations, companies may renege on agreements to change practices because there is nothing to compel them to do so. The report laments that other jurisdictions have taken steps to enhance their enforcement powers while nothing is done in Canada. As a result, the report recommends that stronger enforcement powers be added to the legislation. It identifies as possibilities: adding statutory damages powers to enhance the damages available to complainants who ultimately take their issues to Federal Court; giving the Commissioner order-making powers; and giving the Commissioner the power to impose administrative monetary penalties. Ideally, all three should be added. I note in particular that while statutory damages will improve the individual recourse under the Act, this on its own will not greatly improve compliance under the legislation (see my earlier blog post on individual recourse in privacy cases).

The second pressure point identified in the report is the lack of mandatory reporting for data breaches. The Report notes that as things currently stand, organizations who voluntarily report a data breach face negative publicity, while those who cover up breaches are insulated from reproach. A mandatory data breach reporting provision (which is what the report recommends) would ensure that Canadians are made aware of data breaches, would give Canadians a much clearer picture of the state of personal data security, and would create strong incentives for organizations to improve their privacy practices.

The third pressure point identified is an interesting and important one. PIPEDA contains a provision which allows organizations to voluntarily share personal information with police or other authorities without the consent of the individuals to whom the information relates. Given the increasingly high volumes of personal data in the hands of private sector actors, and the fine grain of detail of much of this information (for example, it may include detailed location information about the movement of individuals over extended periods of time), this should be a matter of great concern. At present there is little or no transparency about the number of requests made by law enforcement for this type of information, nor is there any transparency about the number of times private sector organizations voluntarily share information without insisting upon a warrant. The report’s third recommendation is to require organizations “to publicly report on the number of disclosures they make to law enforcement. . . without knowledge or consent, and without judicial warrant, in order to shed light on the frequency and use of this extraordinary exception.” (at p. 14)

The final pressure point identified in the report is that of demonstrating accountability. Although accountability of organizations for compliance with data protection laws is one of the privacy principles set out in PIPEDA, the report notes that the record of accountability of private sector actors is not all it should be. Not only does the OPC expend significant resources on investigations and audits, they are forced to invest additional resources in follow ups to ensure that there has been compliance with their recommendations.The report recommends that the accountability principle in PIPEDA be amended to require organizations to demonstrate, on the request of the OPC, that they are actually compliant with the law. Further, the report recommends that the law provide for “enforceable agreements” – in other words, undertakings by organizations to comply with the legislation that can be enforced by the OPC if compliance is not actually forthcoming.

Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart is approaching the end of the second term of her appointment. Her leadership of the OPC has been exemplary; she has taken it from a beleaguered and unstable agency to one that has proven its expertise and effectiveness. It has worked with great effectiveness with federal departments and agencies, it has developed effective strategies for public outreach and education, and it has worked tireless to improve data protection in the private sector. The Commissioner has also maintained a high level of communication and collaboration with other data commissioners in Canada and abroad. In short, she has done as much – perhaps more – than one could expect to address the privacy of Canadians in both the public and private sectors under two neglected and outdated privacy statutes. This report is notable for the frank and direct way it publicly addresses the deficiencies in Canada’s private sector data protection legislation. Since the mandated legislative review process set out in PIPEDA has proven utterly ineffective in doing so, the Commissioner has taken the initiative, addressing Canadians directly to explain in plain and direct terms what the problems are and how they might be fixed. Let us hope that the government is listening.